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Wednesday, May 25, 2005
Gang Warfare On 38th Street
A while ago pansy baskets hanging on my front porch met a cruel fate when a pair of mocking birds built their nest on top of the flowers in one basket. Since I couldn't water the flowers, they kaboomed. Yes, I could have maintained the non-nest basket, but, oh, well. It's hot weather now, anyway and pansy time is over.
So there's been this one ugly basket hanging out there, draggly brown plant stems hanging down. My first thought was to throw away the nest, but when I saw a tiny egg, I decided to respect the effort of those little birds. They have faithfully kept their egg warm. I wondered if the egg hatched but feared to look in case that might drive the parents away.
Yesterday I was shocked to see big black crows flapping around on my porch. What in the world? Aha! One of them tried to effect a landing on the nest basket. I surprised myself with the speed at which I tore out onto the porch, shaking my fist and screaming. The crows were surprised, too and flew off the porch but not by much. They sat on a nearby bush, assessed my committment the nest. One crow tried to get back on the porch with me standing right there. The nerve!! I didn't dare to leave.
Lydia came out, too, and asked, "Did the egg hatch yet?" So, I took down the basket and looked. Yep. There was one small baby bird with it's mouth open, soliciting regurgitated insects. Could the crows have intended to eat a baby bird? I didn't know that crows were like that. Whatever they had in mind, they weren't going anywhere. I yelled and clapped my hands, pounded on the porch railing. From the bush they stared insolently back at me. Lydia volunteered to run over to church and get one of the life sized puppets she made and set it on a porch rocker as a scare crow. I told her to forget it. Crows not frightened of a live person jumping, clapping, screaming and yelling at them, would not be impressed with a puppet. Eventually the crows gave up and moved on. I went back into the house.
No, they had not moved on. They had faked me out. I no sooner sat down in my living room, than the crows returned to the porch, flapping around the nest basket. BAM!! I was right back out there jumping and yelling and waving my arms. Again they stayed. So did I. Finally they gave up. I went indoors. They came back. So did I. I wished that I could have just taken the basket into the house with me, but the little parent birds would not have understood. AT LAST the crows flew away and stayed gone.
I got busy and forgot about them until Benny was out showing me how he rides his new bike. Standing on the porch to watch him, I heard a bird fuss come down the street. There were the crows flying toward me again, this time chased by a mob of little birds; mocking birds, robins, starlings, several pigeons, and a blue jay. The small birds co-operated to chase away nest robbers. It was quite an aerial ballet. Little birds attacked when they could, pecked at the crows and then wheeled away out of range. It all went by my house at about second story level, turned and came back. Took them a while, and required a great effort but the little birds won and the crows gave up. Later on I saw a parent bird feeding the baby.
So far, Little Bird Gang---1/ Crow Gang---0. I hope the crows don't return at a time when I'm not around to run them off or when the little bird gang isn't up to strength.
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